


Afterimage

by psocoptera



Category: Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Early Work, M/M, Post-Movie, sort of kid fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-07-09
Updated: 2002-07-09
Packaged: 2018-02-10 11:05:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2022807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psocoptera/pseuds/psocoptera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some years after the movie, Obi-Wan feels a familiar presence.</p><p>(Everything we saw happen in Phantom Menace happened in this 'verse.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Afterimage

When Obi-Wan feels the familiar presence in the Force he thinks for a moment that he's back. That it's all been a big mistake, and that it's all going to be okay now.

But it's not, and he's not. It's almost familiar but not, like someone seen across a crowded square who turns out not to be the name you just called out, and Obi-Wan feels guilty that he could ever mix up this look-alike presence with Qui-Gon. 

It's much younger, for one thing, a messy pulse of Force energy, and Obi-Wan has not made it to Knighthood without developing certain powers of mental clarity: he gets it then. 

"We're cleared for approach," Anakin chirps suddenly, and Obi-Wan nods. It's a little unorthodox to let him do all the piloting, maybe lazy, maybe even a little exploitative, but he wants to, and Obi-Wan doesn't, so he puts on a Jedi Master face and stares off into the middle distance. 

There are upwards of 600 billion sophonts on Coruscant - a full census is impossible, there are entire continents of labyrinthine alleys that even the sun has never seen - but Obi-Wan can pick out one like yellow on blue. He pictures it, a spark behind his eyelids, or maybe a live coal on his skin. He makes himself take a deep breath and refocus. 

Anakin is grinning as they glide through silver towers; they've been away a long time. It's been months since they saw anything bigger than a scientific outpost. Months enough for this... surprise... to greet their homecoming. Anakin chuckles and rolls the ship a little and Obi-Wan has to bite his teeth on the rebuke that wants to snap out. He realizes he is angry. 

They could have told him, he thinks. They could have asked. They could have bloody _waited_. 

What for? says the sensible voice in his head, which sounds a little like Master Windu. What was he to you, that we should have postponed this, with our numbers dwindling? 

My Master, Obi-Wan says. I cared about him. 

But this is a bad argument: in the limiting case, Yoda cares about everyone, and Yoda is basically permanent. Yoda has seen scores of generations come and go; he's had to deal with a thousand reminding echoes in the Force. They can't wait until Yoda is gone, and so they can't wait for Obi-Wan either, and so he is just going to have to accept this presence. But it's like a variation on a song he knows by heart; it's all transposed and out of rhythm and he keeps wanting it to resolve to the original theme. It's not going to. 

Anakin is setting them down on a Temple landing pad - it's a perfect landing, and Obi-Wan knows he should say something, but he can't find the words. He looks at his padawan. Anakin, he realizes, has somehow gotten to be fourteen, or fifteen - he'll be giving his own genetic deposits soon. Maybe on this stopover; _you never know when it'll be too late_. The thought flashes through him and he jerks to his feet and manages not to stumble down the ladder. 

He makes his initial report to the council, fifteen different ways to say things are fine. He's relieved once again that he can basically do this on autopilot. Knight Kenobi persists without Obi-Wan's attention, and right now he's distracted by unfortunate thoughts about the reproductive habits of the various species represented on the council, imagining their various eggs and sperm and spores all on ice somewhere in the glands of the medical complex. He feels sure Yoda is picking up his thoughts and probably Mace too; he pictures the latter in silly polka-dotted underwear and watches the other man's eyebrows rise. He had picked up the small prank from Qui-Gon. 

He concludes for the council that his circuit was entirely normal and can finally turn to the presence waiting in the corner of his eye. Here, he can feel that it isn't even self-aware yet, but when he brushes it tentatively it reaches out curiously. Obi-Wan lets his feet lead him to the creche. Anakin never came here; he hasn't been here for many, many years. 

He stops in the doorway to the nursery. There is a Gennadine sprout in the corner and Obi-Wan thinks of a shower of golden pollen from some dead parent drifting gently down onto a catch sheet. He thinks of his own seed, white inside cold glass, a little spaceship sailing through the deep dark of some freezer somewhere, and pollen scattered like stars. He thinks of golden grains of sand, of feeling so alive in the Force he thought he saw each grain individually. He thinks of grains of sand clinging to Qui-Gon's beard. He had kissed him for the first time, on Tatooine. Destiny had flowed like Qui-Gon's hair and Obi-Wan had suddenly felt sure that kissing him wasn't going to lead to a dangerous attachment. 

It hadn't. 

Except that he is here now, clinging to the doorway. 

Obi-Wan steps forward and looks down into the cradle. One pink fist waves back at him. 

He tries to pretend he can see traces of Qui-Gon's features in the scrunched little face. Then he tries to pretend he can't. It's about the same either way. 

Finally, he lets himself close his eyes, and there, in the Force, the resemblance is unmistakable. He can feel Qui-Gon like a faded afterimage of something bright and his eyes water like there really is a glare. More than Force-sensitivity has bred true here; the child is amazingly like Qui-Gon. He can already feel the stubbornness, the spontaneity. He almost wonders for a moment if the Jedi have relaxed their ban on cloning, but no, looking again, Qui-Gon's genome could never have produced those black eyes. He wonders if the other genetic donor was another Jedi, if the child kicked in the surrogate's womb as much as Qui-Gon probably had. 

He briefly considers stealing the baby, but he is already raising one difficult child. Not to mention the small problem that _true submission to the Force possession precludes_. 

He cannot be a part of this child's life. 

He could die, and maybe in a few years they would thaw out one of his little bottles, and a new little Kenobi could meet this little Jinn. He pictures two small boys running through sunlit halls, two older boys whispering secrets in the dorms, two young men really seeing each other for the first time, outlined in golden light. Curling into each other's arms in the lonely vastnesses between planets. Qui-Gon's seed had splashed hot onto his belly, on that last flight towards Naboo, and they had laughed and talked about counting incoming starships in the Temple gardens. _You never know when it'll be too late._

He feels old, and withered, looking at this lush, plump, glowing little thing. If there was ever anything fertile in him he spent it long ago. Maybe they could revive it from some little vial, maybe their children could have a whole lifetime to spend together. 

But there are no replacements, only new chances, and this one isn't his. 

He somehow knows he has a long time left to live. 

He pictures the child growing up with the Gennadine, running hand in frond. It had been so like Qui-Gon to find friends anywhere, with anyone. Obi-Wan is more withdrawn; he misses Qui-Gon's ease. 

The child is a vibrant wiggle in the back of his mind as he turns away from the cradle. He reaches out into the Force, finds Anakin in the mess hall catching up on Academy gossip. 

As he walks away from the little ghost, he wonders if it will ever be okay. 


End file.
